This might need a new thread; because it blows the size of my OP out of the water.
Detailed Poison Analysis:SummaryAs it stands, poison is mostly a boring elemental school, with little to truly distinguish it from the other schools. Two notable features are that on conjurations spells, more of the damage checks the resist (very little irresistible) and with the exception of Mephiritic Cloud, the Spell School is very quiet compared to others.
All poison spells; cheapest to most expensive (XP Wise) to cast:- Sting - This level one is most directly comparable to Shock and Magic Dart. It seems to have similar accuracy to shock and does similar initial damage (to targets without rPois) to Magic Dart and additional, significantly higher damage over time; however it does very little to the point of useless against rPois targets (most notably Oozes) and completely nothing against rPois+++ targets (most notably zombies and skeletons). Due to the commonality of immune targets, even in the early D and the inaccuracy versus susceptible ones makes it very mediocre as a start spell. It seems to be completely inferior to Magic Dart and Shock MOST the time, with one notable exception, due to the "much higher damage over time", sting is the only level 1 spell with a decent chance of taking out an ogre.
- Spider Form - Significant stepping stone spell in the Transmuter start. The low AC and rPois- means it's virtually useless past early game, however. With a stash of curing to deal with poison should you receive it and decent base Dex and Dodging skill, may be used to deal with the likes of killer bees (with luring tactics, obviously).
- Mephritic Cloud - The best poison magic spell, hands down. Also the only noisy one. This spell is as loud as a fireball or Immolation explosion, very useful in disabling groups of enemies. Has a niche over Confuse and Mass Confusion in that it effects creatures with no rPois, but high MR, like Death Yaks, Vault Wardens and Deep Elves and that it's significantly cheaper to get usable than either of those spells (no spellpower check means as soon as the miscast rate is good, the spell is usable, where Confuse would take heavy investment to get good spellpower.
- Ignite Poison - Perhaps the best designed Poison Magic spell. Very obviously the most deadly for its spell level. Useless by itself, but if combined with reliable sources of poison, turns for example, Poison needles into two turns to kill, instead of waiting for poison to slowly kill the target. Vastly increases the efficacy of other poison magic, venom weapons, poisonous needles, etc.
- Olgreb's Toxic Radiance - Effects everything in LoS and ignores AC. This spell shares a lot of design space with Ozocubu's Refrigeration. However, it works slower (adds poison over time and without ignite poison, that poison takes awhile to kill the targets) and affects fewer things. That said, unless playing very poorly; simply having this spell virtually guarantees clearing Orc and Spider 1-3, due to virtually all creatures there being susceptible.
- Alistair's Intoxication - I have fond memories of this spell, but it's been nerfed and I'm unsure it's worth the investment anymore. Similarly to Mephritic Cloud it will confuse a number of creatures that are very difficult to hex, but the dual restrictions of "no poison resistance" and "human or better intelligence" makes this list... Elves, Vault Guards, Sphinxes, (non-Green) draconians, (non-Putrid) Demonspawn, merfolk, fauns, yaktaurs...a very usable list, but somewhat situational, as that represents about half the high tier threats from those areas (save Elf, most my memories of this spell are abusing it to clear elf early).
- Venom Bolt - One of (3) Bolt spells that are level 5 (instead of 6) and the most powerful of the level 5's, also the quietest bolt altogether. It's significantly more powerful than B.Draining and similar power to Lightning Bolt; without the noise cost that Lightning Bolt has. However it works on fewer targets than either of the other two level 5 bolts.
- Poison Arrow - Versus a susceptible target, this is basically Iron Shot, with slightly higher damage, a longer range and much, much, less noise. Versus a resistant target; it can still one-shot frail things with good enough spellpower (most notably Hellions and Tormentors in extended); but is fairly pitiful, doing less than half it's base damage. Versus a poison immune target...it's just a waste of mana, really. 30% of the damage is irresistible, but that's not enough to be notable, at that point even IMB is better.
- Poisonous Cloud - Back when clouds didn't dissipate upon leaving LoS, this had a significant niche over Freezing Cloud, as it could do more damage outside of LoS and while retreating (say as a Spriggan) with clouds immediately discipating upon leaving LoS, it's strictly worse than Freezing Cloud; EXCEPT, when combined with Ignite Poison (both for making flaming clouds and for applying all the poison damage built up by standing in poisonous clouds at once).
From an analysis perspective, only Mephritic Cloud, Ignite Poison, Olgreb's Toxic Radiance and Alistair's Intoxication truly do anything unique and even then, Ignite Poison + Olgreb's Toxic Radiance as a combo, can be described as "Ozocubu's Refrigeration, which works on fewer targets, but doesn't hit yourself; costs 1 more MP and 2 more turns to use, but takes much less experience to get online. Cool combo for early game, obviously outclassed later.
Additionally the only poison spells worth using past lair branches are Alistair's (it's situational, but confusing Vault Wardens can be worthwhile, etc.) and P.Arrow, which is mostly notable for the range difference from Iron Shot.
Redesign Direction:I'm not about to say that poison is a bad school; currently its niche seems to be "only works well on a very limited subset of monsters, but blows every spellschool out of the water versus that group". (Again OTR is very comparable to Ozocubu's Refrigeration, which is -much- more expensive to get online).
What I'd like to see it shift to is this; (some of this is even a nerf in some ways): Poison as a damage type does more damage than similarly leveled conjurations of other elements and it -completely- ignores AC (where electricity only partially ignores it). But the majority of the damage is dealt over time. The "over time" portion of the damage maxes out at 10 HP/turn, but can be well over enough to one shot (keep damaging after the creature uses self-healing).
Poison expands into more debilitation effects, which are more unique than the damage type. The argument can be made that debilitation is hexes thing and more schools don't need to do it, but...every elemental school has a bolt; more debilitation is significantly more unique than more bolts. Additionally poison's debilitating effects could (1) be different effects [instead of just confusion, twice] and (2) check rPois and HD instead of MR; making it more effective against different targets. Of course there would be some overlap, but then there's the overlap of every single elemental school.
Poison will keep the "better in early game" niche, because a max of 10 HP/Second will directly kill things in fewer turns early in the game and OTR keeps it's niche against heavily armoured creatures in that way. However; higher level and higher spellpower Poison spells should pierce the single rPois+ better (Not rPois+++, like undeads and Gargoyles, obviously; but single + like Hydras and most demons); this would give it a bit of complimentary approach to Necromancy as a damage type; as it encompasses draining (which effects living) and control/dispel undead which effects undead; with no way to hurt demons. Poison would because no way to hurt Undeads/Non-Living but decent against living and demons.
Acid as an addition to poison has been shot down multiple times, so I'll only bring it up only briefly. Acid cannot be an addition to poison, because as it stands Acid is just raw damage (same as just conjurations) with a -AC debuff added. It's exceedingly simple and cannot be added to poison, simpley because it's completely different damage type without any of the restrictions. (Acid would need to be completely reworked to fit in the poison damage school and that doesn't need to happen).
Poison needs (1) variety and (2) a unique niche to justify its existence. I vote that (2) be a focus on extremely high damage/MP, but the damage is slow and over time; partnered with the ability to completely debilitate and incapacitate monsters to allow the damage over time to happen without heavy kiting. And again, as a spellschool low spells only work on living; high spells on living and demons; No spell in the school has any effect on non-living and undead.
I'm beginning to feel like a Cat God! Felid streaks: {FeVM^Sif Muna, FeWn^Dithmenos, FeAr^Pakellas}, {FeEE^Ashenzari, FeEn^Gozag, FeNe^Sif Muna, FeAE^Vehumet...(ongoing)}